William the Fourth Page 6

  Then his cheerfulness departed.

  ‘Though, when you come to think of it,’ he said, ‘it jolly well won’t be much fun for me.’

  ‘Well,’ said Ginger, ‘s’pose we all try to go there the same time. We can leave your ole Aunt Jane somewhere an’ go off, can’t we?’

  William brightened.

  ‘That sounds better,’ he said. ‘I guess she’ll be quite easy to leave.’

  Aunt Jane was so nervous that she did not sleep at all on the night before the day arranged for the treat. Never before in her blameless life had Aunt Jane deliberately entered a place of entertainment.

  ‘I do hope,’ she murmured on the threshold, holding William firmly by the hand, ‘that there’s nothing really wrong in it.’

  She was dressed in a long and voluminous black skirt, a long and voluminous black coat, and a small black hat, adorned with black ears of wheat, perched upon her prim little head.

  Inside she stopped, bewildered. The glaring lights, the noise, the shouting, seemed to be drawing Aunt Jane’s eyes out of her sockets and through her large, round spectacles.

  ‘It isn’t a bit what I thought, William,’ she said. ‘I imagined just stalls – just quiet, plain stalls. Why are they throwing balls about, William?’

  ‘It’s a coconut-shy,’ said William.

  ‘Can – can anyone do it?’ said Aunt Jane.

  Anyone can try,’ said William, ‘if they pay twopence.’

  And what happens if they knock it off?’

  ‘They get the coconut,’ explained William loftily.

  ‘I – I wonder if it’s very difficult,’ mused Aunt Jane.

  At this moment a well-aimed ball sent a coconut rolling in the sawdust. Aunt Jane gave a little scream.

  ‘Oh, he did it! He did it!’ she cried. ‘I – I’d love to try. There – there can’t be anything wrong in it.’

  With trembling fingers she handed the man twopence and took the three wooden balls. A sudden hush of astonishment fell on the crowd when Aunt Jane’s curious figure came to the fore. At the first throw she shook her hat crooked, at the second she shook a tail of hair down, at the third she shook off her spectacles. The third ball went wider of the mark than all the others, and hit a young man on the shoulder. Seeing Aunt Jane, however, he only smiled. She demanded another twopenny-worth. The bystanders cheered her loudly. The crowd round the coconut-shy stall grew. People from afar thought it was an accident, and crowded up to watch. Then they saw Aunt Jane and stayed.

  At last, after her sixth shot, Aunt Jane, flushed and panting and dishevelled, turned to William.

  ‘It’s much more difficult than it looks, William,’ she said regretfully, as she straightened her hat and hair. ‘I would have liked to have knocked one off.’

  ‘What about me?’ said William coldly.

  ‘Oh, yes,’ she said. ‘You must try, too.’ So she paid another twopence, and William tried, too. But the crowd began to melt away at once, and even the proprietor began to look bored. William realised that he was an anticlimax and felt dispirited.

  ‘You should use more force, I think, William,’ said Aunt Jane, ‘and more directness of aim.’

  William growled.

  ‘Well, you didn’t do it,’ he said aggressively.

  ‘No,’ said Aunt Jane, ‘but I think with practice—’

  Here William was cheered by the sight of Henry and Douglas and Ginger, who had all managed to evade lawful authority, and come to the help of William. They had decided to hide from Aunt Jane and then abscond with William. But Aunt Jane hardly saw them. She hurried on ahead, her cheeks flushed, her eyes alight, and her prim little hat awry.

  AT THE FIRST THROW AUNT JANE SHOOK HER HAT CROOKED . . . THE BYSTANDERS CHEERED HER LOUDLY.

  ‘It has,’ she said, ‘a decidedly inspiriting effect, the light and music and crowds – decidedly inspiriting.’

  She halted before a roundabout.

  ‘I wonder if it’s enjoyable,’ she said musingly. ‘The circular motion, of course, might be monotonous.’

  However, she decided to try it. She paid for William and Douglas, and Henry, and Ginger, and herself, and mounted a giant cock. It began. She clung on for dear life. It went faster and faster. There came a gleam into her eyes, a smile of rapture to her lips. Again the crowd gathered to watch her. She looked at the people as the roundabout slowed down.

  ‘How happy they all look,’ she said innocently. ‘It’s – it’s quite a pleasant motion, isn’t it? It seems a pity to get off.’

  She stayed on, clinging convulsively to the pole, with one elastic-sided boot waving wildly. She stayed on yet again. She seemed to find the circular motion anything but monotonous. It seemed to give her a joy that all her blameless life had so far failed to produce.

  William and Ginger had to climb down, pale and rather unsteady. Henry and Douglas followed their example the next time it stopped. But still Aunt Jane stayed on, smiling blissfully, her hat dangling over one ear. And still the crowd at the roundabout grew. The rest of the fair ground was comparatively empty. All the fun of the fair was centred on Aunt Jane.

  CLINGING CONVULSIVELY TO THE POLE WITH ONE ELASTIC-SIDED BOOT WAVING WILDLY.

  At last she descended from her mount and joined the rather depressed-looking group of boys who were her escort.

  ‘It’s curious,’ she said, ‘how much pleasanter is a circular motion than a straight one. This is much more exhilarating than, say, a train journey. And, of course, the music adds to the pleasantness.’

  ‘Well,’ said William, ‘you jolly well stayed on.’

  ‘It seemed,’ she said, ‘such a pity to get off.’

  The little party moved from the roundabout followed by most of the crowd. The crowd liked Aunt Jane. They wouldn’t have lost sight of her for anything. Aunt Jane, for the first time in her life, appealed to the British Public. William and his friends felt themselves to be in a curious position. They had meant to leave Aunt Jane to her fate and go off to their own devices. But it did not seem possible to leave Aunt Jane, because everything seemed to centre round Aunt Jane, and they would only have been at the back of the crowd instead of at the front. But they felt that their position as escort of Aunt Jane was not a dignified one. Moreover, their feats drew forth none of the applause which Aunt Jane’s feats drew forth. They felt neglected by the world in general.

  Aunt Jane was next attracted by the poster of the Fat Woman outside one of the tents. She fixed her spectacles sternly, and approached the man who was crying the charms of the damsel.

  ‘Surely that picture is a gross exaggeration, my good man?’ she said.

  ‘Hexaggeration?’ he repeated. ‘It isn’t ’arf the truth. That’s wot it isn’t. It isn’t ’arf the truth. We – we couldn’t get ’er on the picture if we made ’er as big as wot she is. Hexaggeration? Why – she’s a walkin’ mountain, that’s wot she is. A reg’lar walkin’ mountain. Come in and see ’er. Come in and judge for yerselves. Jus’ come in and see if wot I’m tellin’ yer isn’t gospel.’

  Somehow or other they were swept in. Aunt Jane sat on the front seat. She gazed intently upon the Fat Woman, who sat at her ease upon a small platform.

  ‘She seems,’ said Aunt Jane, ‘unnaturally large, certainly’

  The showman discoursed upon the size of the Fat Woman, and then invited the audience to draw near.

  ‘Touch ’er if yer want,’ he said. ‘Touch ’er and see she’s reel. No decepshun.’

  Aunt Jane drew near with the rest and accosted the showman.

  ‘Has she ever tried any of those fat-reducing foods?’ she said.

  The man looked at William.

  ‘Is she batty?’ he said simply.

  ‘If you’ll give me her address I’ll talk to my doctor about her. I think something might be done to make her less abnormal.’

  At this the walking mountain rose threateningly from her gilded couch.

  ‘ ’Ere,’ she said, ‘’oo yer a-callin’ nimes of? You tell
me that. ’Oo yer a-giving of yer sauce to? You talk ter me strite art if yer wants to an’ I’ll talk ter yer back – not ’arf. Don’t go a ’urlin’ of yer hinsults at me through ’im. My young man – ’e’ll talk ter yer, nah, if yer wants.’

  ‘ ’Er young man, he’s the Strong Man in the next tent,’ explained the man. ‘They’re fiancies, they are. An’ ’e’s the divil an’ all to tackle, ’e is. I’d advise yer, as friend to friend, to clear, afore she calls of ’im.’

  But Aunt Jane, the imitation wheat in her hat trembling with emotion was already ‘clearing’.

  ‘They quite misunderstood,’ she said, as soon as she had ‘cleared’. ‘The word “abnormal” conveys no insult, surely. I think I’ll return and explain. I’ll refer them to the dictionary and the derivation of the word. It simply means something outside the usual rule. If—’

  She was returning eagerly to the tent to explain, but found the entrance blocked by a crowd, so she was persuaded to postpone her explanation. Moreover, she had caught sight of the Hoop-la, and was anxious to have the system explained to her. William wearily explained it.

  ‘Oh, I see,’ said Aunt Jane, ‘a test of dexterity and accuracy of aim. Shall we – shall we try?’

  They tried. They tried till William was tired. She had determined to ‘get something’ or die. The crowd was gathering again. They applauded her efforts. Aunt Jane was too short-sighted to notice the crowd, but she heard its shouts.

  ‘Isn’t everyone encouraging?’ she murmured to William. ‘It’s most gratifying. It’s really a very pleasant place.’

  She actually did get something. One of her wildly-flung hoops fell over a tie-pin of the extremely flashy variety, which she received with glowing pride and handed to William. The crowd cheered, but Aunt Jane was quite oblivious of the crowd.

  ‘Come along,’ she said. ‘Let’s do something else.’

  Ginger disconsolately announced his intention of going home. Henry and Douglas followed his example, and William was left alone to escort Aunt Jane through the mazes of the Land of Pleasure. It was at this point that things really seemed to go to Aunt Jane’s head. She went down the Helter Skelter four or five times – sailing down on her little mat with squeaks of joy. She forgot now to straighten her hat or her hair. Her eyes gleamed with a strange light, her cheeks were flushed.

  WILLIAM WAS LEFT ALONE TO ESCORT AUNT JANE THROUGH THE MAZES OF THE LAND OF PLEASURE.

  ‘There’s something quite rejuvenating about it all, William,’ she murmured. She had her fortune told by a Gipsy Queen, who prophesied an early marriage with one of her many suitors.

  She went again on the roundabout, she had another coconut-shy she went on the Switchback, the Fairy Boat, and the Wild Sea Waves. William trailed along behind her. He refused to venture on the Wild Sea Waves, and watched her on them with a certain grudging admiration.

  ‘Crumbs!’ he murmured, ‘she must have gotter inside of iron!’

  Finally Aunt Jane espied a stall at a distance. Under a flaring gas-flame a man in a white coat was pulling out long strings of soft candy. Aunt Jane approached.

  ‘What an appetising odour!’ commented Aunt Jane. ‘Do you think he’s selling it?’ William thought he was.

  And the glorious climax of that strange night was the sight of Aunt Jane standing under the flaring gas-jet devouring soft pull-out candy

  ‘ ’Ullo! ’Ere’s the gime old bird,’ said a man passing.

  ‘I don’t see any bird, do you?’ said Aunt Jane to William, peering round with her short-sighted eyes, ‘but this is a very palatable confection, is it not?’

  Then a clock struck, and into Aunt Jane’s face came the look that Cinderella’s face must have worn when the clock struck twelve.

  ‘William,’ she said, ‘that surely was not ten?’

  ‘Sounded like ten,’ said William.

  Aunt Jane put down her last stick of pull-out candy unfinished.

  ‘We – we ought to go,’ she said weakly.

  ‘Well,’ said William’s mother when they returned. ‘I do hope it wasn’t too tiring for you.’

  Aunt Jane sat down on a chair and thought. She thought over the evening. No, she couldn’t really have done all that – have seen all that. It was impossible – quite impossible. It must be imagination. She must have seen someone else doing all those things. She must have gone quietly round with William and watched him enjoy himself. Of course that was all she’d done. It must have been. The other was unthinkable.

  So she smiled, a patient, weary little smile.

  ‘Well, of course,’ she said, ‘I’m a little tired but I think William enjoyed it.’

  CHAPTER 6

  ‘KIDNAPPERS’

  There was quite a flutter in the village when the d’Arceys came to the Grange. A branch of the d’Arcey family, you know. Lord d’Arcey and Lady d’Arcey and Lady Barbara d’Arcey. Lady Barbara was seven years of age. She was fair, frilly, fascinating. Lady d’Arcey engaged a dancing-master to come down from London once a week to teach her dancing. They invited several of the children of the village to join. They invited William. His mother was delighted, but William – freckled, untidy, and seldom clean – was horrified to the depth of his soul. No entreaties or threats could move him. He said he didn’t care what they did to him; he said they could kill him if they liked. He said he’d rather be killed than go to an ole dancing class anyway, with that soft-looking kid. Well, he didn’t care who her father was. She was a soft-looking kid, and he wasn’t going to no dancing class with her. Wildly ignoring the rules that govern the uses of the negative, he frequently reiterated that he wasn’t going to no dancing class with her. He wouldn’t be seen speaking to her, much less dancing with her.

  His mother almost wept.

  ‘You see,’ she explained to Ethel, William’s grown-up sister, ‘it puts us at a sort of disadvantage. And Lady d’Arcey is so nice, and it’s so kind of them to ask William!’

  William’s sister, however, took a wholly different view of the matter.

  ‘It might put them,’ she said, ‘a good deal more against us if William went!’

  William’s mother admitted that there was something in that.

  William lay in the loft, reclining at length on his front, his chin resting on his hands. He was engaged in reading. On one side of him stood a bottle of liquorice water, which he had made himself; on the other was a large slab of cake, which he had stolen from the larder. On his freckled face was the look of scowling ferocity that it always wore in any mental effort. The fact that his jaws had ceased to work, though the cake was yet unfinished, testified to the enthralling interest of the story he was reading.

  ‘Black-hearted Dick dragged the fair maid by the wrist to the captain’s cave. A bottle of grog stood at the captain’s right hand. The captain slipped a mask over his eyes, and smiled a sinister smile. He twirled his long black moustachios with one hand.

  ‘“Unhand the maiden, dog,” he said.

  ‘Then he swept her a stately bow.

  ‘“Fair maid,” he said, “unless thy father bring me sixty thousand crowns tonight, thy doom is sealed. Thou shalt swing from yon lone pine-tree!”

  ‘The maiden gave a piercing scream. Then she looked closely at the masked face.

  ‘“Who – who art thou?” she faltered.

  ‘Again the captain’s sinister smile flickered beneath the mask.

  ‘“Rudolph of the Red Hand,” he said.

  ‘At these terrible words the maiden swooned into the arms of Black-hearted Dick.

  ‘“A-ha,” said the grim Rudolph, with a sneer. “No man lives who does not tremble at those words.”

  ‘And again that smile curved his dread lips, as he looked at the yet unconscious maiden.

  ‘For well he knew that the sixty thousand crowns would be his that even.

  ‘ “Let her be treated with all courtesy – till tonight,” he said as he turned away’

  William heaved a deep sigh and took a long draught of
liquorice water.

  It seemed an easy and wholly delightful way of earning money

  ‘They’re awfully nice people,’ said Ethel the next day at breakfast, ‘and it is so kind of them to ask us to tea.’

  ‘Very,’ said Mrs Brown, ‘and they say, “Bring the little boy”.’

  The little boy looked up, with the sinister smile he had been practising.

  ‘Me?’ he said. ‘Ha!’

  He wished he had a mask, because, though he felt he could manage the smile quite well, the narrative had said nothing about the expression of the upper part of Rudolph of the Red Hand’s face. However, he felt that his customary scowl would do quite well.

  ‘You’ll come, dear, won’t you?’ said Mrs Brown sweetly.

  ‘I wouldn’t make him,’ said Ethel nervously. ‘You know what he’s like sometimes.’

  Mrs Brown knew. William – a mute, scowling protest – was no ornament to a drawing-room.

  ‘But wouldn’t you like to meet the little girl?’ said Mrs Brown persuasively.

  ‘Huh!’ ejaculated William.

  The monosyllable looks weak and meaningless in print. As William pronounced it, it was pregnant with scorn and derision and sinister meaning. He curled imaginary moustachios as he uttered it. He looked round upon his assembled family. Then he uttered the monosyllable again with a yet more sinister smile and scowl. He wondered if Rudolph of the Red Hand had a mother who tried to make him go out to tea. He decided that he probably hadn’t. Life would be much simpler if you hadn’t.

  With another short, sharp ‘Ha!’ he left the room.

  William sat on an old packing-case in a disused barn.

  Before him stood Ginger, who shared the same classroom in school and pursued much the same occupations and recreations out of school. They were not a popular couple in the neighbourhood.

  William was wearing a mask. The story had not stated what sort of mask Rudolph of the Red Hand had worn, but William supposed it was an ordinary sort of mask. He had one that he’d bought last Fifth of November, and it seemed a pity to waste it. Moreover, it had the advantage of having moustachios attached. It covered his nose and cheeks, leaving holes for his eyes. It represented fat, red, smiling cheeks, an enormous red nose, and fluffy grey whiskers. William, on looking at himself in the glass, had felt a slight misgiving. It had been appropriate to the festive season of November 5th, but he wondered whether it was sufficiently sinister to represent Rudolph of the Red Hand. However, it was a mask, and he could turn his lips into a sinister smile under it, and that was the main thing. He had definitely and finally embraced a career of crime. On the table before him stood a bottle of liquorice water with an irregularly printed label: GROG. He looked round at his brave.